While not bothering to calculate it down to the precise minute, spring is arriving in the northern hemisphere today. Iâ€™ll confess that Iâ€™ve been in a bit of a funk lately and this winter has been a particularly trying one for a number of reasons. But this is the time when hope springs eternal, plants begin to bloom, love is in the air and all of that romantic nonsense, right? Why not find something pleasant to focus on even in the midst of far too much depressing news.Iâ€™d first like to share with you a column written back in the...

Just when you thought yesterday’s dismal jobs numbers couldn’t get any worse -- they did. According to CNSNews.com, nearly seventy-five percent of all civilian jobs created since the beginning of last summer are in the public sector: Seventy-three percent of the new civilian jobs created in the United States over the last five months are in government, according to official data published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. In June, a total of 142,415,000 people were employed in the U.S, according to the BLS, including 19,938,000 who were employed by federal, state and local governments. By November, according to data...

One might think that yours truly, who has been nagging the establishment press for years over its blind acceptance of seasonally adjusted data in government economic and employment reports, would be pleased to see that the Associated Press's Christopher Rugaber finally got around to making such adjustments the primary focus of his final report on the most recently released unemployment claims numbers on Thursday. His story's headline at the AP's national site even noted that "Seasonal adjustments to economic data can mislead." That's fine, but it's not yesterday's full story. Rugaber noted that Thursday's report from the Department of Labor...

Blistering Holiday Hiring Shreds The "All The Growth Is From Inventory" Scaremongers Joe Weisenthal Nov. 5, 2010, 3:02 PM When Q3 GDP came in at 2%, bears pointed out that it was all due to inventory rebuilding, and that the economy was fundamentally not strong. But as we pointed out at the time, you should only fear an inventory build if the end demand isn't there to follow it up. And though we don't know for sure, this would confirm that the demand will be there. Holiday hiring, as this chart from Calculated Risk shows, is already at a blistering...

The unemployment rate edged down slightly to 10.0 percent in November from 10.2 percent in October, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. There was only a net job loss of 11,000 in October. In the prior 3 months, payroll job losses had averaged 135,000 a month. The flatenning of the unemployment can largely attributed to gains in the number of temp workers. Employment in professional and business services rose by 86,000 in November.Temporary help services accounted for the majority of the increase, adding 52,000 jobs. Since July, temporary help services employment has risen by 117,000. Employers using temp services...

Patients taking statin drugs were almost 50 percent less likely to die from flu, researchers reported on Thursday in a study providing more evidence the cholesterol-lowering drugs help the body cope with infection. The findings are compelling enough to justify doing controlled studies in which some patients are given the drugs deliberately and some are not, said Meredith Vandermeer of the Oregon Public Health Division, who helped lead the study. "Our preliminary study shows these cholesterol-lowering medications called statins are associated with a decrease in mortality," Vandermeer told a news conference at a meeting of the Infectious Diseases Society of...

Oct. 29, 2009 (Philadelphia) -- Once again, the popular cholesterol-lowering statin drugs have been shown to be good for more than the heart: They may also lower your odds of dying of the flu. In a large study of people hospitalized with seasonal influenza, those who were taking statins were about 50% less likely to die than those who weren't taking the drugs. "Our preliminary research suggests there may be a role for statins in influenza treatment," says Meredith VanderMeer, MPH, of the Oregon Public Health Division. The statin drugs include Crestor, Lescol, Lipitor, Mevacor, Pravachol, and Zocor. The findings...

Well, I've come down with flu like symptoms and it's been 2 days of no fun. My major symptoms are not what I'd call life-threatening, they are what I'd call annoying. I am experiencing: 1) Major back pain and body aches. Don't look at my back, it hurts. Need advil to lie down. 2) Exhaustion. I want to lie down. I don't care if it hurts. My minor symptoms are: 1) Minor, not severe ear pain 2) Minor but gone almost immediately sore throat 3) Initial onset of headache, gone 1st night prior to other symptoms 4) Stomach quesiness but...

New York (CBS) -- The first doses of the H1N1 vaccine are expected to be released this week. While that is bringing relief to some Americans, it's also helping to ignite a controversy for one group, as CBS News correspondent Randall Pinkston reports. Outside New York 's capitol building, health care workers - shouting "Give me liberty!" - vowed to fight an unprecedented order from state health officials: a requirement for every health care worker to get seasonal and H1N1 flu shots or face the possibility of being fired.

Health care institutions, concerned that less than half their workers got flu shots in previous years, are moving for the first time to make the shots mandatory in the face of an expected swine flu pandemic. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention figures for the 2007-08 flu season, the most recent available, show that just 45.4 percent of U.S. health care workers ages 19 to 64 were immunized against seasonal flu that year. Three British surveys released in recent weeks suggest the same pattern with the novel H1N1 virus, commonly known as the "swine flu" virus. But Dr. Tom Talbot,...

Despite a planned rally in Albany Tuesday to protest a state regulation requiring health care workers be vaccinated against influenza — both seasonal and swine flu — New York’s top public health official predicts dissenters will ultimately extinguish their anger and roll up their sleeves.

Despite a planned rally in Albany Tuesday to protest a state regulation requiring health care workers be vaccinated against influenza — both seasonal and swine flu — New York’s top public health official predicts dissenters will ultimately extinguish their anger and roll up their sleeves. http://www.newsday.com/long-island/mandatory-flu-vaccination-splits-workers-1.1481242?print=true

Who needs vaccine against regular winter flu, and who should be first in line for the swine flu shot? There's lots of overlap. Regular flu vaccine is available now, and people who need it most include: _Adults 50 and older. _All children age 6 months to 18 years. _Pregnant women. _People of any age with chronic health problems like asthma, heart disease or a weakened immune system.

Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley (D) on Wednesday said it was residents' "patriotic duty" to get seasonal flu shots in coming weeks to make it easier for health officials to determine if outbreaks are related to H1N1, or swine flu. If residents do not get vaccinated against seasonal strains and later get sickened by them as a result, there will be little way to determine if those falling ill this fall and winter have been infected by less worrisome strains, or by the more contagious H1N1 virus, O'Malley said. The governor characterized that scenario as serious because it could stress supplies...

All U.S. children aged 6 months to 18 years should get a seasonal influenza vaccine every year, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said on Friday. The CDC's Dr. Anne Schuchat said the agency was strengthening recommendations for children to get the vaccination against seasonal influenza, especially with fears that the new H1N1 virus will be added to the already expected burden of seasonal flu.

Congress gave final legislative approval Tuesday to an emergency plan to ease hiring restrictions on U.S. businesses that have been blocked from employing seasonal workers from other countries. ADVERTISEMENT The Senate unanimously included the plan as part of an $82 billion Iraq and Afghanistan military spending bill. President Bush is expected to sign the package, setting the stage for seasonal hires as early as June. The plan addresses a labor crunch in a visa program that authorizes U.S. firms to hire temporary foreign workers for seasonal jobs often shunned by Americans. Fierce competition claimed the 66,000 available visas by Jan....

U.N.: Seasonal Ozone Hole Disappeared Thu Nov 20, 2:45 PM ET GENEVA - The seasonal "ozone hole" over the South Pole has disappeared again after reaching record size earlier this year, U.N. officials said Thursday. The hole is a thinner-than-usual area in the protective layer of gas high up in the Earth's atmosphere. It has been forming in the extremely low temperatures that mark the end of Antarctic winter every year since the mid-1980s, largely due to chemical pollution. This year, the hole peaked at 10.81 million square miles in mid-September — matching the record size set three years ago....